Software Development Ramblings

Monthly Archives: March 2015

What would some use cases be for a smart phone with lots of storage space? The first market that comes to mind is the developing markets where cell data is expensive and slow for most people. The second is just comes from enabling better customer experiences through a faster user interface. The third is in gaming and video streaming.

Think of an app like Yelp, if yelp could store it’s top N restaurants in the current city for the user, then they could zip through the interface in their search for a bite to eat instead of waiting on a network call every time they wanted to see the next 10 restaurants or wanted to switch category filters.

Or Amazon prime instant video, enabling people to download HD content at home and watch it on the road without burning their battery life and data plan.

Or maps that don’t have to reload tiles each time, and could cache the users common routes on phone so the user gets their directions faster and with fewer privacy concerns.

A business user could take their entire email history with them and be able to search through it while on a plane.

The downside is that phones are lost/stolen often and that could create more of an information security hazard, but I’d wager that if people are willing to turn their phones into credit cards, car keys and garage door openers then they shouldn’t be afraid of a thief seeing which Amazon movies they have downloaded.

Higher storage devices would enable streaming like services that don’t always need an internet connection. The app could download a wide selection of music onto the device overnight and provide a similar playback experience to what there is today. Or if piracy is a concern the app could just store 80% of the sound range and stream 20%.

The bottom line is that larger storage capacity is cheap, and could enable longer battery life and better use experience in the hands of a clever development team.